[No Politics] What you need to know about CoVID-19 by SARS-CoV-2 [No Politics]

[MediumRare]

In an all-to-rare piece of good news, Illinois is on track to go to 50% capacity in cinemas, health clubs, and other indoor facilities this Friday. The decision has been based on pre-established data tracking across a range of regions, with all metrics in the "green" zone for 14 consecutive days in all regions.

Describes the situation: https://www.nbcchicago.com/news/loc...zker-releases-guidelines-for-phase-4/2293469/
Data and graphs, by region: https://www.dph.illinois.gov/restore

 

[Thomas_A]

I agree that in the Swedish case it seems like a thoughtful though perhaps misguided strategy. In the US case I wonder if there is indeed any strategy. In the Netherlands I think we made three big mistakes. The first was not to stockpile enough protective material. The second was for the provincial governor of the southern province of Brabant to allow Carnival celebrations to go ahead (they are indoors in large part) even though the virus was already raging in Italy. I remember my wife and myself looking at each other and saying: 'are they mad?' I suppose it was politically inconvenient to ban Carnival in this quite conservative catholic province, but even so, it produced the by far largest concentration of infections. Up in the north where we live there have been virtually no cases at all. The third was to wait one week too much before imposing our lockdown. The rersult was that our peak was about as bad as it could be, but the lockdown was highly effective, and very quickly reduced case numbers, even though the lockdown was never complete. Shops remained open, and so did a fair number of busineses if they could provide safe working conditions. Public transport continued at a much reduced level, and we were never banned from going out for a walk or, as in my case, a long bicycle ride. It suggests that a lockdown does not have to be complete to be effective. People were very disciplined, to be sure. The Swedes of course went further along this road, and maybe too far.

Problem is timing. According to GISAID, SARS-CoV-2 were already circulating before most knew it. Those countries with the largest seeds of virus got struck hardest. Not many later cases could be traced to Italy, they came from everywhere.

 

[MediumRare]

Yes it appears that the protests did not lead to a significant increase in COVID19 cases for NY. The second bar graph, what website are you using?

This is the official New York State data: https://forward.ny.gov/covid-19-regional-metrics-dashboard

Thanks to a friend in the area who sent me the link. I wish we had this in Illinois, with the regional data graphed so clearly for the key metrics.

 

[Ron Texas]

@MediumRare

Here are some numbers:
Illinois, population 12.6 million, peak COVID-19 daily deaths, 104. Presently around 40.
Texas, population 30 million, peak COVID-19 daily deaths, 31. Presently around 26.

What I see is about 1/4 the per capita daily deaths in Texas as compared to Illinois. Don't tell me we are doing something wrong.

I'm tired of people quoting headlines from BS news outlets, so I will no longer answer your posts.

 

[Racheski]

The thing is that the impact of other infections are identical in Sweden and Finland. Also, the immunity as measured by antibodies are just 2x difference between the countries. If "heard immunity" is a strategy, based on available evidence of seroprevalence, the strategy looks similar in many countries (1-5 %).

Not sure I catch your drift...Sweden has 5.5k cases per million. Finland has 1.2k cases per million. Finland imposed a lockdown mid-March.

 

[MediumRare]

@MediumRare

Here are some numbers:
Illinois, population 12.6 million, peak COVID-19 daily deaths, 104. Presently around 40.
Texas, population 30 million, peak COVID-19 daily deaths, 31. Presently around 26.

What I see is about 1/4 the per capita daily deaths in Texas as compared to Illinois. Don't tell me we are doing something wrong.

I'm tired of people quoting headlines from BS news outlets.

Please don't take this personally.

Are you actually arguing that because X location is worse (whose curve started earlier) than Y location (whose curve started later) that is somehow conclusive? Without correcting for: Timing, population density, age curve, superspreader events?

If that were the case Brazil would have been the world champion.

It's wonderful that the fatality rate in Texas has been so low. I've mentioned this previously. Hopefully it's because medical protocols have advanced, which would be good news for everyone, rather than some issue with the data. The all-cause excess death stats will show us the truth eventually, however, many states are slow to report this. In illinois the counties are weeks/months ahead of the state.

 

[krabapple]

Please no more Fauci; he just keeps contradicting himself. The CDC originally recommended that healthy people not wear masks because they were worried about shortages for healthcare workers and claimed to not know about asymptomatic transmission. Shortages for healthcare workers is not a scientific reason to recommend against masks, it is a political one.

Healthcare workers were/are being exposed to massively more positive cases than others, even as they are working to fight the effects of the infection in others. And any infected healthcare workers of course could infect others, possibly being 'superspreaders' due to the level of their exposure. Furthermore at the beginning there was a lack of clarity about how transmissible SARS-Cov2 was via various airborne means. So when there was a shortage of PPE at the start it made sense to direct scarce resources to healthcare workers...masks included, on the precautionary principle. Because again, the fear was that healthcare system could be overwhelmed.

And it was never *just* masks being recommended. THe sad fact is that around the US, the actual list of recommendations has been followed spottily at best, all along, or not at all. The way to beat the pandemic has ALWAYS been (testing and tracing) + quarantine, and that triple-play has barely been done at all, on a per capita basis. Much of what we did get was second-best -- quarantine in place, etc.

There were dozens of studies and reports of pre symptomatic and asymptomatic Transmission of the virus prior to April 3rd when the CDC changed their mind about masks.
https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/26/7/20-1595_article

Tony Fauci isn't CDC. He's NIAID (the branch of the NIH devoted to infectious diseases). The last thing we need is for online warriors/armchair experts to be dismissing /demonizing him.

And while CDC has been a mess, I fear you overstate the case re: dozens. Are you including preprints?

 

[krabapple]

I know this is semantic, but there is nothing dangerous or inherently wrong with herd immunity, what is dangerous is trying to achieve Covid19 herd immunity without an available vaccine. I would prefer to call what Branko is referring to as the “Swedish Strategy.”

Yes, it is semantic.
Herd immunity is a natural phenomenon that pre-existed the invention of vaccines. Herd immunity is inherently as dangerous as the pathogen is. Vaccines are not an inherent element of herd immunity, they are man-made tools to artificially produce herd immunity (i.e., herd immunity is an inherent element of vaccination). In the real world, not the semantic one, we don't have a vaccine for this pathogen. So the danger applies in *any* strategy that is relying on herd immunity in the real world now. Including the 'swedish strategy'.

 

[Thomas_A]

Not sure I catch your drift...Sweden has 5.5k cases per million. Finland has 1.2k cases per million. Finland imposed a lockdown mid-March.

The seroprvalence is around 2x in Sweden vs Finland. Looking at the impact of invasive pneumococci, the results are identical in the two countries - 90% down in April and May. So social distancing caused the same results for other respiratory diseases. It could well been that the initial virus load was much greater in Sweden at start, especially in Stockholm.

 

[maty]

[ For those who have been asking why the US daily deaths curve continues to trend down, despite cases trending up for ~a month ]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1275130333294403584

It is the same thing that is happening now in Spain. In Catalonia CCAA, the population sector that generates the most positives is between 18 and 29 years old, hence the slight symptoms in new cases. But because of it, the virus will soon pick up new momentum in Spain, if it has not already.

The most vulnerable people do protect themselves, which is why there are fewer hospital and ICU admissions and, consequently, fewer deaths.

 

[Deleted member 65]

In summerhouse, listening to Joan Baez ”Sad eyes lady of the lowlands”. She reconciling with Dylan, beautiful song amidst all viruses ... Sony-XRS77 speaker, not bad.

 

[Ron Texas]

[ For those who have been asking why the US daily deaths curve continues to trend down, despite cases trending up for ~a month ]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1275130333294403584

If the mortality rate is going down, they we are winning.

 

[maty]

You are wrong. The BIG problemIt is that this will lead us to continuous outbreaks and an economic CATASTROPHE of dimensions that many do not want to assume.

Antibodies only last a maximum of three months. In the asymptomatic much less. So reinfection after reinfection, increasing the percentage of the population with severe sequelae now hidden -> health spending can skyrocket even further and for a long time.

There is no guarantee that an asymptomatic will be again next time.

 

[maty]

[ Portugal’s prime minister, António Costa, said some coronavirus restrictions would be reimposed in Lisbon to help control outbreaks. Costa said measures from Tuesday included restriction on gatherings of more than 10 people and orders for cafes and shops close at 8pm ]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1275140126369296384

 

[Willem]

I suppose the age shift reflects previous underreporting and undertesting.

 

[maty]

[ Confirmation of the new wave came as the Israeli government said a lockdown could be reintroduced amid a sharp rise in cases, and a team of contact tracing experts prepared to deploy to the Australian state of Victoria to tackle a new outbreak in Melbourne. ]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1275140818773426177

 

[Frank Dernie]

Please no more Fauci; he just keeps contradicting himself. The CDC originally recommended that healthy people not wear masks because they were worried about shortages for healthcare workers and claimed to not know about asymptomatic transmission. Shortages for healthcare workers is not a scientific reason to recommend against masks, it is a political one. There were dozens of studies and reports of pre symptomatic and asymptomatic Transmission of the virus prior to April 3rd when the CDC changed their mind about masks.
https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/26/7/20-1595_article

Here in the UK masks were not recommended either despite being mandatory in many other countries (which had much better control of the outbreak than us) and data about their effectiveness being widely distributed (@maty published data here weeks ago).
My view is that here, where the hospitals were very short of PPE and unprepared, the last thing the government needed was the population buying up all the masks.
It is pretty clear that here the recommendation that masks were not needed was political not medical. Maybe it was in the USA too?

 

[maty]

[ Controversy in France over the thousands of people who crowded the streets in the #FeteDeLaMusique.
Here are some of the images that have outraged many ]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1275126430993723400

 

[Willem]

Not many later cases could be traced to Italy, they came from everywhere.

The early cases in the Netherlands were almost all from people who had come back from skiing holidays in Italy when nobody realized how bad the situation in Italy had already become. These people then went on to celebrate Carnival. Countries later in the pandemic had much more advance warning. This applies to Scandinavia, but also to many Eastern European democracies that often managed to keep infection rates quite low. By this argument, the US should also have done relatively well, of course.

 

[maty]

[ Two weeks ago, I expressed my concern about Texas hospitalization data. Two weeks later, it's worse. Much, much worse. ]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1275144967350968320